Cybersecurity--an IT issue or compliance issue?

• Position: CYBERSECURITY

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Increasingly, cyber attacks on financial institutions are focusing on interrupting service to users. Consequently, distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks have become a notable headache for many financial institutions. They are also a reminder of looming responsibility for the organizations' compliance departments, wrote Compliance Completes Emmanuel Olaoye in a recent Reuters article.

DDoS attacks have become so problematic that the Depository Trust Clearing Corp. (DTCC) considers them one of the three types of attacks that pose a systemic risk to the financial system. (DTCC settles the majority of securities transactions in the United States.) Because regulators are asking more questions about security for such attacks, some contend cybersecurity is becoming a compliance issue. As such, compliance departments may need to become more involved instead of relegating the issue to IT.

Science Apphcations International Corporation's chief cyber security technologist, Gib Sorebo, advises compliance professionals to speak to their IT or information security colleagues when a regulation is...